Patrick Kearney

Patrick teaches insight (vipassanā) meditation and Buddhist philosophy in retreats, workshops and seminars around Australia. He teaches in the lineage founded by Mahāsī Sayādaw of Burma (1904-1980), who was one of the great revivers of Buddhist meditation in the modern era.

Patrick began meditation practice in Sri Lanka in 1976. He trained in Zen Buddhism for five years, from 1977 to 1982, in Australia and Hawaii. His teacher was Robert Aitken Rōshi of the Diamond Sangha, Hawaii.

From 1982 to 1984 Patrick travelled in South and South East Asia, where he studied Buddhism and Buddhist meditation. He began practising insight meditation in the Mahāsī lineage in 1984, at Mahāsī Sāsana Yeiktha (Mahāsī Meditation Centre) in Yangon, Myanmar, under the guidance of Ovādācariya Sayādaw U Pandita Bhivamsa. Since then he has trained with a number of teachers in the Mahāsī lineage, mostly in Myanmar.

From 1986 to 1989 Patrick was a bhikkhu (Buddhist monk) in Myanmar and Thailand. Returning to Australia in 1989 as a layman, from 1990 to 1995 he studied Sanskrit at the Australian National University, and Religious Studies externally from Deakin University. During this time he began teaching meditation retreats in Australia, at the Blue Mountains Insight Meditation Centre. From 1996 to 2000 he studied for a PhD in Buddhist Studies at the University of Queensland, where he also taught university courses and continued to teach meditation.

Since 2000 Patrick has been a full time dharma teacher, leading intensive meditation retreats and teaching workshops and seminars on Buddhism and Buddhist meditation.